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Blue Jays good and lucky against Cardinals

Toronto Blue Jays outfielder Jose Bautista is interfered with by a fan while tracking a pop up against the St. Louis Cardinals at the Rogers Centre in Toronto, June 6, 2014. (ERNEST DOROSZUK/QMI Agency)

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Through this remarkable run by the Blue Jays in which they have now won 20 of their last 24 games, they have won with big bats, big defence, big arms and some big luck.

Seldom, though, have all those elements come together in one game as they did in this 3-1 victory over the defending National League champion St. Louis Cardinals.

The Jays got home runs from Jose Bautista and Brett Lawrie. Those same two gentlemen delivered game-changing defensive plays in the first inning. Toronto got some clutch pitching, first from Marcus Stroman, who walked a tightrope early on before settling in for six solid innings, then from relievers Brett Cecil, and especially Dustin McGowan. At the end there was Casey Janssen, as usual tying it all up in a neat package for his 11th save.

And the luck? Well, they survived a triple play against them. They survived even though they left 13 men on base, including leaving the bases loaded twice. They survived a Steve Bartman-like play in the ninth as a fan interfered with Bautista in right field as he was about to make a catch.

In the end, they had their 38th win to go 14 games over .500, remaining comfortably ahead of the pack in the American League East.

“We’re playing great baseball and we’re enjoying a great couple of months and we need to keep doing that so we can get to the playoffs,” said Bautista. “We need to stay with the same consistent approach, same effort. It’s a lot of fun when you’re winning. It’s the first time I’ve ever experienced anything like this at this level so I’m enjoying it as well.”

Stroman allowed just one run and seven hits over six innings (plus one batter in the seventh) for his second win in his second start.

“Today Stroman did a terrific job and so did our bullpen,” said Bautista. “They really picked us up because we did leave a lot of baserunners on today. We still got the win because of how good they did on the pitching side.”

But it all could have been very different.

Matt Carpenter, the first batter of the game, worked Stroman for a walk and eventually scored. It would have been a much more damaging inning for the Blue Jays without two outstanding defensive plays behind their young pitcher.

After Oscar Taveras flew out to centre field, Matt Holliday’s ground rule double put runners at second and third with one out for Allen Craig. Craig singled between first and second, scoring Carpenter, but Bautista came up throwing as Holliday tried to make it all the way from second. The throw was perfect and Holliday was out.

With Craig still in scoring position and two out, Yadier Molina hit a ball up the middle that Lawrie tracked down and made a leaping throw across his body while going away from the bag, getting Molina at first on a play not many second basemen can make.

“Lawrie’s range plays better at second base so if you watch him enough out there, he’s going to amaze you,” said Gibbons.

Stroman was not sharp through the first three innings, allowing seven baserunners before settling in.

“Right out of the gate he struggled a little bit but it changed when he started using all his pitches,” said manager John Gibbons. “Early on he was pumping in fastballs but later he went to his breaking ball and that made all the difference in the world.”

In the bottom of the third Bautista stepped in to lead off against Lynn. He looked at a ball, took a strike, looked at another ball, then hammered the next pitch into the left field bullpen for his 15th homer of the season to tie the game.

That’s the way it stayed until, with two outs in the fifth, Lawrie hit a 2-1 pitch over the wall just to the right of dead centre field for his 11th homer run to give the Jays and Stroman a 2-1 advantage.

In the top of the sixth, with Cards’ reliever Seth Maness taking over for Lynn, the Blue Jays appeared to really have something going when they loaded the bases on singles by Gose and Reyes, followed by an error on a ball hit to third base by Melky Cabrera. With nobody out, that brought Bautista to the plate. He looked at two balls, then lashed a liner to second baseman Daniel Descalso. He caught it on the fly, flipped to shortstop Jhonny Peralta to double off Reyes and then on to first to get Cabrera, who had broken from first, for the seventh triple play to be recorded against the Blue Jays in their history.

When Tony Cruz singled to lead off the St. Louis seventh, it was the end of Stroman’s evening. Reliever Brett Cecil walked the first man he faced, Matt Carpenter, before inducing a pop-up to left from Taveras. Gibbons then summoned Dustin McGowan from the bullpen to deal with righthanded batters Holliday and Craig. He got a broken bat grounder from Holliday, hit too softly for Lawrie and Reyes to turn a double play. They got the out at second and then Craig grounded out to Francisco at third to end the threat.

The Jays got an important insurance run in the bottom of the eighth on a Jose Reyes RBI single.

With one out in the top of the ninth Cruz hit a foul ball down the right field line. Bautista was in position to make the catch in the field of play when a fan reached out and impeded him. The Jays asked for a replay review and the batter was called out at the end of it.